The Relation Between Focus in Prayer and Reading Quran with Reflection

At this level, we might have at least finished reading the whole Quran once, and we might have memorized some surah. However, do we understand what we have recited?

Focus in Prayer

We read al-Fatihah at least 17 times per day in our prayer. Do we remember god while we pray?

When we pray, we immediately turn into an auto-pilot. At some point up above the sky, the pilot puts the airplane into auto-pilot mode and the plane moves by itself. That’s what is happening to us nowadays in our prayer.

We stand, ruku’, sujood, while our mouth are reciting the prayer, but it was only a movement. In the middle of prayer, we suddenly ask, “How many rakaah did I pray?” The rituals are there, but the heart is not present.

Hamza Yusuf in his lecture, The Human Heart has explained on this issue – how do we bring our ibadah to life? The first is to recognize that the spiritual heart has died.

So, how do we bring our spiritual heart to life again? One of the ways to bring the heart to live again is by reading the Quran with reflection.

Reading Quran with Reflection

After all, the Quran keeps emphasizing on thinking, thinking and thinking;

The word ‘zikr’ means ‘remembrance’. We are constantly reminded to do zikr of Allah, which is to remember Allah. However, we can only remember the thing/person that we already know. Do we already know Allah before we were even born? Reflect Surah Al-A’raf [7:172]. [Refer article: The Connection Between Heart & Brain and its effects in our Prayer]

The responsibilities of our prophet s.a.w is summarized in the second verse of Surah Al-Jumuah [62:2] : “He’s the one who sent among the unlettered people, a Prophet, and he sent him to recite his verses, to purify them, and to teach the book and the hikma.” The English translation for hikma is wisdom. Imam Syafi’e in his famous book about Usool Fiqh, said the hikmah is the sunnah. What wisdom has to do with Sunnah? [Refer article: Wisdom in Prophetic Teachings]

Parents. What does it take to make your children still talking to you even when they have grown up? What should you do to make them feel comfortable even to share their night dream with you? Learn this important lesson from Surah Yusuf. [Refer article: Parenting Lesson – That No One Has Ever Told You]

The name of Allah, Rahman and Raheem, both comes from the same root word, ‘ra’, ‘ha’ and ‘mim’. For Rahman, we add ‘alif’ and ‘nun’, while for Raheem, we add the word ‘ya’. What difference does it make? And why Bismillah is continued with al-Rahman and al-Raheem? After all, Allah has 99 names.

With deep reflection on verses of the Quran, I honestly hope that people from this religion can be people of deep thought, and later can contribute to raising a generation that is thoughtful.